Scraps Of Mind

Cuttlebugs and Creativity

Well Summer is in full swing here in Oz. And I’ll be honest with you; I haven’t done much in the scrapbooking line for a few months.

But I haven’t shut up shop entirely. My Tuesday night craft group ensures that I still keep projects on the go.

Last year I introduced Marla to the concept of  Artist Trading Cards and I’ve never seen someone embrace anything with as much enthusiasm as she has with ATCs. She’s joined several swap groups and in a few short months she’s built up a huge collection, filling two binders already. She makes beautiful ATCs as you can see here.

At the moment she’s got a couple of swaps which she’s organising herself, so in a fit of buddy support I’ve volunteered to contribute to them. Here’s one of my efforts on the theme of ‘birds and feathers’. It’s called Soar.

Like many of my ATCs it’s a hybrid of digital and paper/scissors techniques. I find this approach especially useful when I have to make 7 cards all the same. I can design the backgound, duplicate it and print out 7 identical versions. Then add the cut outs and three dimensional stuff. In many cases I’ll print out digital elements, cut them out and mount them with foam tape, mixed in with ‘real life’ embellishments, as I’ve done here.

Cuttlebug Crafting

The group has recently clubbed together and purchased a communal Cuttlebug. I wasn’t that excited until I gave it a try myself.

What a bunch of fun it was! Quite ordinary looking card or paper embossed a gorgeous patterned texture which looks fabulous in card or scrapbooking projects. Or you can create embossed embellishments using card or papers that coordinate with your scrapbook layouts. Here are a couple of cards I made for my niece’s  birthdays and one for another niece’s engagement. I just love the effect.

If you are a user of one of these babies and have some cool ideas for ways to use it, I’d love it if you could share them in the comments below. Often something that seems quite straightforward to one person can sound like a revelation to another. We’re all still pretty new to the world of Cuttlebugs so we’d welcome any suggestions that help to get the most value from it.

What is your favourite scrapbooking tool?

And whilst on the subject of scrapbooking equipment…do you have a favourite piece of equipment that you just love?

Even though I’m in love with the Cuttlebug at the moment, I think I would have to say that my fine cutting scissors are really my favourite piece of scrapbooking equipment.

I love my little embroidery scissors but I recently bought a funny looking pair that have now taken first place on my scrapbooking ‘must have’ tools list. They have no normal handles and you work them by squeezing the single handle which works a spring which works the blades. They really take the effort out of cutting and there’s no more red indentations on my thumb and fingers when I have to do a lot of cutting. And best of all, they make doing really fine and detailed cutting so easy.

Well as you can see, I seem to be drifting back to the more tactile side of papercrafting, after spending the last 18 months immersed in the world of digital scrapbooking. I still like to combine the two wherever possible. Most of my cards and ATCs are hybrid creations. And I think that I’ll always prefer the freedom that digital gives me when creating scrapbook layouts. But I’m really enjoying getting back into the ‘glue and paper’ stuff again.

Other Related Articles:

Artist Trading Card Swaps

Christmas Card Making in July

Worldwide Christmas Scrapbooking Freebies

Yes folks it’s on again!

Antoinette from  Sparky’s Scratches has organised another huge roundup of scrapbooking freebies for your crafting pleasure.

Just click on the logo below to get to the special blog she has set up with all the links to a Wonderful World of Christmas Scrapbooking and Cardmaking items

I didn’t have anything to do with the organising of this year’s event being otherwise occupied cruising up the Danube and down the Rhine, but I’ve come home in time to do my part in providing some Christmas Word Art Freebies for you.

Just click on the sample graphic and you will open a .PNG file. Save this file to your computer and you should be able to use it with any of the mainstream graphics editing programs (eg. Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, Paintshop Pro).  You can resize the image to fit your scrapbook layout or card.

Enjoy.

(This looks better in the PNG format. the O doesn’t look so good in this sample)

Make sure you visit the other contributors to the Worldwide Christmas Scrapbooking Freebies.

National Cardmaking Day

October 3rd is National Cardmaking Day So I thought I’d share one of my more special cards with you. Hope you enjoy.

Hybrid Card Making for Someone Special

My daughter recently celebrated a birthday, and in what has now become an annual tradition, I flew up to Sydney to spend her birthday weekend with her.

It’s been a difficult year for her and I wanted to make her a card to let her know how much she means to me and how much I admire her.

I used my favourite card making technique…hybrid scrapbooking.

I always enjoy the enormous scope for creativity I get by combining digital with paper elements. I can tailor my digital elements to suit my project by changing the colours, size and even the overall shape.

For this card I used a chipboard concertina mini book as the base and all the digital elements are from my Night over Rhone kit (available free through the Step by Step Digital Scrapbook Program) combined with some papers from Thao Cosgrove’s Art Journal Kit from Scrap Girls.

I used the masking tool to extract the images of Seona from the rest of the photo so that I could feature her. After all , this card is all about her.

Then I desaturated the background of the photos  and blended them into the background papers by reducing the opacity a little. That way I got a silhouette of Seona whilst still keeping some context of her surroundings.

The arched window from Night over Rhone is one of my favourite elements and it is very easy to change the shape and size of it so that it fits the arched shape of the chipboard page. And there’s something special about putting a photo behind a window frame I think. It sort of gives the idea of looking in on a private moment.

It’s no secret that I am a huge fan of flowers and brads, both digital and ‘real life’ so no card of mine would be complete unless I managed to incorporate some into the design.

Seona was very happy with the card. She said, “Oooh, my first ‘book’ card!”

I and I realised that I hadn’t made her a card in book form before.  She has a significant birthday coming up next year, her first significant one since I started card making, so I’ll really be pulling out the stops for that.

And you can back it in that whatever I decide to do I’ll be using hybrid scrapbooking to do it.

Other Related Articles:

Hybrid Scrapbooking – The Best of Both Worlds

Hybrid Scrapbooking – What’s it all about?